The Baseball Desert

Saturday, October 18, 2003

Here we go

Looking back over what I've posted on here since I started the blog back in June, I can see that I've spent a lot of time wishing good things for certain teams that got to the postseason but didn't make it to the Series (the Red Sox, and then the Cubs) and others that never really got close to the playoffs (the Expos and the Phillies). When people have asked me which team is 'my' team, I've generally described myself as a nominal Yankees fan, but, above all, a fan of the game. Having always lived in the baseball desert known as 'Europe', I have no real historical, sentimental or geographical links to any particular ballclub, and although that deprives me of both the agony and the ecstasy of the fan who follows a particular team (see yesterday's post), it also puts me in the privileged position of being able to simply look forward to the upcoming World Series and hope that we'll see some great baseball. I've lived and died with sports teams in the past, back in the days when I was a crazy soccer fan following my home-town team all over England, so I can relate to those who live and die with the Red Sox or the Cubs (or the Royals, as is the case with ESPN.com's Rob Neyer, who has written a great piece on why we care). At the same time, that level of emotional involvement really is sometimes just too hard to take, and it's nice to be able to have the easy option of just wanting to see some good ballgames. You don't need to worry about goats or curses or 85 years without a World Series, because sometimes it's just all about baseball.